


Off the Wall

by Lanerose



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII
Genre: As disturbing as that is, Contains slight one-sided Don Corneo/Elena, Gen, Sorry Not Sorry, Turks in Disguise!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-06-10
Updated: 2007-06-10
Packaged: 2018-06-05 15:02:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6709702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lanerose/pseuds/Lanerose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Turks on a mission in Midgar pre-game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Off the Wall

"Remember," Reno's voice whispered through Elena's earpiece as she strolled into Wall Market that warm summer evening, "if you screw up, we're not coming back for you, yo."

"I know, I know," she hissed under her breath, covering the movement of her mouth by adjusting the shawl around her shoulders. The flimsy pink gauze just barely managed to make her feel better about the low-cut, slinky red dress that Reno had undoubtedly snagged from Scarlet's quarters. Her stilettos kept sticking in the sloppy, muddy ground.

"Also, don't lose that wig. You don't want to know what Rude had to do to get it, right, Rude?" Reno was laughing at her. She could tell. Rude didn't say anything, but she could picture him nodding, and wondered for the thousandth time how had put up with Reno for as many years as he had. Lifestream only knew what Shinra must be paying the man to keep him on salary.

Elena scowled, walking on her toes and taking baby steps to keep her heels from getting any dirtier. Her shoes had already shifted from a fiery red to more of a brick red, and they would be brown before she reached her destination if they got any dirtier. Tseng had better be compensating her for their loss.

"Hey, baby, where you going?"

The waist-length strawberry-blonde wig whipped around her body as she turned quickly at the sound of the voice. A brown-haired man in a green shirt that looked like it hadn't been washed in months was running his eyes up and down her body, paying special attention to the front slit in her skirt and the deep V-neck. She dropped her head down to the right as a scowl crossed her face. As he walked closer, Elena counted slowly to ten. When that didn't work, she counted the ten best ways to kill him. She had just reached slicing his balls off and leaving him to bleed to death when his arm wrapped around her shoulders.

"How 'bout you come with me, huh, babe? I got a buddy who's a real big shot, looking for a classy dame like you." His hand slid down her shoulder, a little lower on her chest. "I bet he would treat you real nice."

"You think?" She asked, peering up at him from underneath her eyelashes, turning so that his hand went back to where it belonged.

"Oh yeah." His turned her to face deeper into the Market, rubbing his hand up and down her arm as he not so subtly brushed his fingers against his chest. He guided her forwards. "Come on."

They walked quickly through Sector Six, Elena practically running on her toes to keep up with the Don's underling. She catalogued a few hostile expressions – mainly directed at the man beside her – and an envious look from one of the younger girls at the Honeybee, as well as the pitying glance from women older and more careworn than herself. The last made her want to blush the most, though. She should know better, they seemed to say, and on any other day, she would have. A red-headed punk sneered at her as she passed. Planet, how did she let those clowns talk her into this stuff?

"Right this way," her escort said, guiding her into the Don's shop, through the back and up the stairs. He paused outside an ornate set of double doors, releasing her and stepping in front of her. He pushed them open, calling, "Don Corneo, I've got one for you!"

Elena walked slowly down the long Wutaiian red rug, eyeing the twin green snakes emblazoned on it. How appropriate. The Don sat on a throne behind a desk in the center of the room. Around his neck, on a heavy chain just as Rude had described for her, hung the data card she had been sent to find. The Don jumped off his throne as he caught sight of her and came bouncing over.

"Oh, she's a looker, too! I love a girl who isn't afraid to show a little skin. Great job, isn't it Nikolas, Xander?" The Don glanced at his two henchmen over his shoulder. The one on the left, with curly dark hair and a pair of guns hooked to his belt, nodded and glanced at his co-worker. The henchman on the right, with smooth black hair loose around his face and the red bindi indicative of Wutaiian faith bright on his forehead, studied her carefully before nodding as well. The Don grinned, clapping his hands. "You have some fantastic taste, Rodrigo! I'll take her now, and maybe you can have her later."

The short, balding man extended a pudgy hand to her, and she placed her own palm lightly within his grasp. He pulled her behind the shade and into the next room. He climbed clumsily onto the bed. The quilt was embroidered with the Wutaiian character for heaven, and she wondered if he was ignorant or optimistic as she sat down.

"Alone at last." He placed a meaty hand on her thigh, running it up and down her leg. "You're tense, kitten. Anything I can do to help?"

"Well…" Elena looked at him, eyes wide. She placed her hand on top of his, guiding it so that it brushed aside the slit fabric, bit by bit revealing more of her leg. With the top of her head, she nudged at him until he looked her in the eyes.

"Yes, pussycat? What can Papa do for you?" He leaned down, his breath stale as three day old bread. She lifted her hand from on top of his and brought it to his lips, stopping them inches from her own as his hand rested on her leg.

"You can give me that disk around your neck, and quietly, if you want to keep your family jewels." Elena's eyes glowed with satisfaction as he glanced at his lap to see the knife she had drawn from her thigh holster pointed straight at his goodies.

"Just don't do anything rash, all right, I don't mind, I don't mind, you can take it –" His hands shakily reached up and drew the cord over his head. Elena turned her palm up expectantly. Don Corneo lowered the data into her hand, carefully placing the chain on top as though afraid that the weight might jar the hand holding the blade. She wrapped her fingers tight around the card before leaning just a bit more with her knife. The don squeaked.

"Pleasure doing business," Elena whispered before drawing the knife back and dashing back the way she had come.

"GUARDS! GUARDS, GET THAT WOMAN!" Corneo shouted as she slipped through the double doors of his office. Elena jumped the railing, tucking and rolling as she hit the ground to keep the impact off her feet. The Wutaiian from earlier leaped over the desk as she sprinted through the doors to the don's private section of the club.

The club itself was deserted as usual. Her heels clicked on the floor as she hurried through, echoing in the empty space unlike the gentle thuds of the man behind her's footsteps. She rushed into Wall Market, heading for the path back to the train station. Elena could hear the man behind her getting steadily closer.

Ahead of her was a punk with red hair and sunglasses, standing beside a man in a hat. Neither was large, but the two of them together were more than enough to block the path. Behind her, the man lunged for her, grabbing her by the top of the head. The wig came off easily – Elena pulled free of it and kept moving.

"Out of the way!"

"STOP, THIEF!"

Any other sector, on any other day, and Elena would have been away scot-free. She _would_ have the rotten luck to run into the only good citizens Midgar ever had on a day when she was doing something not strictly legal. Both moved firmly into her path, and the punk reached his arms up to block her when she went to jump over them. She kneed the punk as he tried to wrap his arms around her. He let go of her, stumbling back with a muttered curse.

Elena pushed away from him, only to find the Don's man grappling her from behind. Grateful for the damn things for the first time that evening, she trounced a stiletto down on the center of his right foot. He howled in pain, and the blonde took the opportunity to pull herself free from his grip. She started forward again.

"I wouldn't try anything if I were you," the man in the hat said, crossing his arms in front of his chest and staring her down. Elena stopped, looking quickly around the market. More of the don's men, including the don himself, were approaching from behind her. The stores on either side were built of old metal – too smooth to get a good hand hold and too likely that she'd cut herself on something rusty if she managed one. The don's place was a dead end.

Elena took a deep breath, and charged the man in the hat, aiming to duck under his left arm. He let her go, only to grab her around the waist. She twisted in his arms, rolling her body off his arm and against his side as she slipped from his hand and knocked against him, jarring him enough to loosen his hold.

"You don't know when to quit, do you?" the punk snarled as he grabbed the left arm she had gotten free from the taller man in the hat. Between the two of them, they forced her down onto the ground. The man whose foot she had stomped earlier grabbed the knife she had dropped somewhere in the fray and placed it at her throat. She went still.

"Well, well…" wheezed Don Corneo as he huffed to a stop beside them, "looks like the pussycat is actually a hellion in disguise."

The man with the knife pulled the disk from her hand. He handed the knife to the punk and rose, limping calmly over to the don. The short man accepted it, smiling, as Elena glared at him.

"What should we do with her, sir?" The man asked, glancing dismissively down at her.

"Well," the don puffed, "these two boys were nice enough to do us a favor. How about we let them take her for a ride before you take her out permanently? You can have the rest of the night off when you're done."

A hand came to rest on her shoulder. Elena glared up at its owner, her own blue eyes reflected in the man's sunglasses as he squeezed lightly and inched the blade against her throat a little higher. The don's employee coughed.

"Thank you sir."

"Any time." The don turned and wandered back into his building, his other guards following. Elena and the men around her watched them go in silence.

When at last the don and all of his underlings had disappeared, the punk removed the knife from her throat and released her. The man in the hat pulled his hand back from her shoulder and instead offered it to her. He helped her gently to her feet.

"So, want to go for a _ride_ , Elena?" The punk pulled off his sunglasses, and Elena could finally glare into the almost Mako-bright blue eyes that had been laughing at her all night. She straightened her dress and stuck her tongue out at him.

"Thanks, Reno." She let go of Rude's hand and stood up straight. "Good to know you remembered to put the helicopter somewhere secure this time so that we won't have to walk back -"

"It only got stolen that ONE -"

"- which is good, because I think I broke Tseng's foot." The blonde turned to the Wutaiian man, who was already pulling his hair back into its usual ponytail. "I am sorry, sir. Are you all right?"

"Nothing a Cure or two won't fix." Tseng winced a little as he tentatively put weight on it, but smiled at her. Beside them, Rude had pulled off his hat and grabbed his sunglasses back from Reno. He placed them back on his face, the world set mostly to rights again.

"What, I don't get an apology? After everything I did to make -"

"No," Rude's deep voice interrupted, smoothly cutting off his partner, "you probably deserved that."

"RUDE! I thought you were on my side, yo! Ganging up on me isn't fair –"

"You got the information, sir?" Elena asked, stooping to pick up the strawberry blonde wig from where it had fallen. Tseng nodded.

"The real disk has been in my possession since early this morning." He pulled a card identical to the one the don had been wearing from his back pocket and offered it to Elena. She eyed it carefully. Amazing, how much information one of those small cards could hold, and how much it could be worth. She nodded, and he put it away. "When he asks tomorrow, I'll say one of those "helpful citizens" must have been in on the plot, since they knocked me out and let you get away later."

"No one in Midgar does anything for free, huh?" Reno snorted and tapped the electromag he'd removed from his pocket against his shoulder. A moment passed in silence.

"Shall we return to base, sir?" Elena asked.

"Let's," Tseng replied.

Together, the four headed off into the darkening Midgar evening.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written as part of gen_challenge for Sister Coyote.


End file.
